In this video here I'm going to show you how anyone can paint a simple cloud with some simple
directions from me this is a must-see if you're a brand new painter here we go when it comes
to making an easy simple to do and realistic Cloud you got to have the right supplies which
I did you a favor and put it down in the video description below if you click on any of those
links that does help me out so thank you now we want to start with making sure you have the right
paint to make a cloud for this lesson here we're going to use a firm paint from Winsor Newton that
is titanium white now this is actually too firm of a paint for clouds which is probably why some
of you struggle we actually want to give it some slight flexibility or just have it slightly firm
and to do that I'm going to introduce a medium into it which is gamblin solvent free gel
just a little bit now if you don't have gamblin solvent gel you can use any clear medium heck
you can even use Liquid white or liquid clear or if you're in a pinch thinner will do now you
just need a mixer paint thoroughly so that that it's still firm but has some slight flexibility
how will you know well your paintbrush should go through your paint easily but still hold a lot
of the paint Strokes on the mixing palette when you have that you've got a nice paint that'll
work perfectly for a cloud now I want you to take your fan brush and I want you to load it
up on both sides yes you want a lot of paint load it up on both sides and for the last few
Strokes take it through the paint and wiggle the paint brush through what this is going to
do is it ensures that you kind of move the paint from on the back end of the bristles towards the
front allowing you to paint with more paint very simple and easy technique to do now when you're
ready to put a cloud on your canvas you have to decide where it goes don't overthink it kind of
be loose and free trust me it'll help you for the rest of the lesson here now when you're actually
ready to paint your Cloud on your canvas I'm going to take your fan brush and I want you to hold it
directly straight at the canvas an approach we're going to put it then before you touch your canvas
I want you to turn it 90 degrees perpendicular to your canvas this is going to expose the actual
corner of the paintbrush which is we're going to do a lot of our painting with and gives us
more control while creating some awesome effects as we go through more on that in just a moment
now from here I want you to either dip your elbow or wrist down or I want you to dip your elbow and
wrist up this will give you different effects for your Cloud play around with it and you discover
them for this tutorial I'm just going to dip mine down which is going to expose the back end of the
fan brush a little bit more allowing me to push creating awesome little crowns why don't you do
that with me so that way we can do it all together now with my loaded up fan brush all I have to do
is really just mimic whisking an egg or pancake batter with my wrist and hands and a little bit
of your forearm your elbow and shoulder and body is more of a stabilizing mechanic here
just so you can keep the correct motion and you want to make sure that the fan brush constantly
keeps moving as we approach our canvas with the correct technique I want you to touch the canvas
with just the corner of the brush and just gingerly start whisking you can go up down
left right you can make your Cloud as thin or as thick as you want and you can make whatever shape
you want all you need to be concerned with is the outer edge of a cloud because we're going to build
the body in just a second I recommend start with a thinner section and work out to a bigger Bloom and
Cloud fluffiness if you will this will give you a better visualization as you go the biggest mistake
people make is they generally just start doing big circles and they can't visualize it if you start
small with some whisking and you go up down left and right you can generally figure out a shape as
you go through and then take it off to the end of the can canvas there allow me to reiterate you're
only worried about making the outside edge of your Cloud we do not care about what happens below that
outside edge or the body we're going to do that in just a moment think about the outside edge
only and while we're here only only do one Cloud at a time it's a huge beginner mistake when people
try to do four five six seven clowns at a Time One Cloud we're gonna nail it and then move on
to the next one now as you paint your cloud with your fan brush the most common question I always
get asked is wild when I take my white paint and paint on a blue background to paint my cloud my
cloud becomes dull dingy and contaminated because of the blue that gets on the paintbrush extremely
common and that happens so don't worry about it what you want to do is get yourself a shop towel
and wipe off your fan brush in between loading of it or for when you want to do multiple sections of
highlights or whatever you're going going through or if you simply run out of paint which will be
very common for brand new painters because you're just going to go because you don't know what
you're doing it's okay once you go you know what take that fan brush wipe it off completely heck
don't be afraid to pinch the paint off go back to your mixing palette and reload it's perfectly fine
in fact I actually recommend you do that every time you need also don't be afraid to paint with
both corners of your fan brush just simply flip it over and continue the whisking motion to finish
off your Cloud now with a one or two inch brush we're going to Anchor that cloud into the reality
of that landscape what I want you to do and I'm going to illustrate on my two inch brush here is
I want you to approach your cloud and then tip the handle up what that does is it exposes just
these top bristles here that's all we're gonna use and yes you can do that on a one inch brush
too just tip it up and now we're just using these bristles here this allows you to have more control
what we're going to do is only touch the bottom of the cloud but we're going to work our way through
the entire Cloud by doing small circles here and I want you to start light when you do these small
circles you're taking the bottom of the cloud and really anchoring it into the reality of
this landscape that you're developing here it's going to make it look like it's actually sitting
perfectly within this landscape now the technique I want you to start with is small circles and work
from there the longer you sit and you hypnotize or you blend the cloud in and make it Velvet Smooth
the more it's going to get pushed back further and further into that landscape so remember that
for your your your perspective of depth that you may be trying to get that's a little more intense
we'll talk about that at another lesson plan just simply lightly Hypnotize The Cloud as you
go through if you want to push it back or you want more transparent all you need to do is it's just
push harder on the canvas and do slightly bigger circles with more pressure now during this entire
step you do not touch the top of the clamp that is a no touch zone now clean off your one or two inch
brush completely with a blue shop towel and now we get to build the body I like to do full cross
Strokes across my entire Cloud working from the top of the cloud which I like to call the crowns
and pulling it down towards the bottom of my cloud what this does is it builds body and character and
shape into your Cloud effortless effortlessly effortlessly there we go oh my gosh I got it
without having to do too much work I should have said that so just gingerly lay your paintbrush
your two inch brush if you can one inch will work as well at a 45 degree angle and what that does
is it exposes these outside bristles here and it allows you to have an extremely light touch lay
it at that 45 or 65 if you're a math a magician and gingerly pull down the softest stroke you've
ever done go diagonally across your entire Cloud when you get to one side I want you to flip the
brush over and come down across this way basically making X's all the way through it this is going to
pull that paint down into the body or Cloud really giving it an awesome shape now if your paintbrush
was covered in white paint from the first time you went across and you got a little bit of white
outside and above or below your Cloud that's fine the very last step will clean it up but
if there's a big glob feel free to just wipe it off and blend it in gingerly with a smaller brush
since we pulled some of that paint down towards the bottom of our Cloud I want to re-anchor it and
give it some more shade I'm going to take my two inch brush and lay it up that same 45 or 65 degree
and go across horizontally with some very long and extremely soft X strokes this again is just going
to Anchor that cloud in there that may have been um re-unquered if you will by that extra heavy
paint this will just give it that little extra blend motion at the bottom and it's going to look
beautiful now let's give our Cloud a little bit of motion by making it look like wind is moving
through or just kissing it ever so slightly I want you to take your two inch brush and yes a two inch
brush is way easier here and lay it out that same 45 or 65 degree angle about an inch below where
your cloud is cemented in your landscape and I want you to kind of do a soft J slash check mark
motion all the way through the cloud and I do mean from the bottom of the cloud past the top of the
cloud this is going to give you a full range of motion and this is the slightest touch you've ever
done in your life you simply just want to work through it using all of the bristles that you
possibly have on your paintbrush and just go up you can go to the left or you can go to the right
and you can slant it more one way or more another way it's your Cloud if you're right-handed you're
gonna have an easier time starting from the bottom left and going up to the top right and
if you're left-handed it's the opposite bottom right to top left but feel free to mix it up
it's your environment but for the sake of realism generally wind goes all one way or the other so
let's just go to the right for this one here at this point here your Cloud should really start to
take extreme shape in fact it's pretty much done we just have to work out the extra paint Strokes
depending if your paintbrush was heavy-handed with paint on the bristles and more paint got
below the cloud I recommend doing those long X drops again just so that it Blends into the
background of your sky and now we just have to do parallel Strokes across your entire cloud in
fact I like doing it pretty much across my entire canvas what is ever easier for you right to left
or left to right start from what feels comfortable and just gingerly work your way a across the cloud
I personally like to work from the bottom of the cloud all the way up through the top to work out
all the strokes and this is going to make all The Strokes parallel across the canvas so that weight
doesn't look like there's too much um chaos I guess going on in your Cloud it's going to make
it look like it's a natural realistic Cloud Bravo you just easily created a cloud in oil paint now
you might be looking at yours and going hey yeah that looks really good but it could be
better if you want to take the next step to really accentuate your cloud to make it look like it has
highlight Shadow more wind or sunlight is kissing or piercing through parts of your Cloud that's
easily something you can do and we'll do it right now all you need to do is take your fan brush that
needs to be clean and load up the corner of the fan brush with the same paint mixture that we
used for our cloud and wherever you think sunlight or wind would be kissing into your cloud is where
I want you to add some extra highlight now please pay attention to where the light source is because
light obviously creates a high light so think about that and they're not generally always on
top of the cloud sometimes they can be underneath and in different parts of the body of the cloud if
you really want to make things easier for you just make them on top nobody's going to care as you get
more advanced you can start looking at realistic clouds and mimicking how sunlight hits them but
all you need to do is have the lightest touch again with a fully loaded fan brush on just that
corner and just whisk in ever so lightly where you think a highlight would be don't go overboard here
because again we're trying to make it realistic and just add those simple little highlights now
follow the same steps blend in just slightly the bottom of the Highlight probably using a smaller
brush or a clean fan brush here and then do some X Strokes through it to create it back into the body
giving it more of a natural shape that builds that body then blend out the bottom if you need
to if you want heavy-handed give it a nice lift with a one or two inch brush and then blend out
your paint Strokes making it look natural into your landscape this is the easiest way to start
painting a cloud and nailing them right off the bat I teach this technique to people that have never
held a paintbrush in their life and they nail a cloud you can do it too just take your time and
do one Cloud at a time when you nail it and then if you want to add highlights after that move on
to your next Club think about how they need to be displayed in your landscape don't be afraid
to use a reference photo and before you know it you're going to be a cloud master I know this
video is going to help you out and you can help me out by going down below and hitting that like
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I think I'm gonna go look at some clouds I'll check you all later take care and of course Peace